1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a remote device connection and control system, and more particularly, to a remote peripheral device connection and control system.
2. Description of the Related Art
For many kinds of in-house services (such as security, health care or automation), neighborhood service, facility service, factory automation or checkout automation in supermarkets, it is necessary to provide services through connection ports of a host, e.g., RS232, IrDA, USB, Zigbee or Bluetooth, or otherwise connect to the device of the host. A common requirement for such services is communication connections and control of remote devices.
An important, related issue concerns expanding the number and kinds of connection ports of the peripheral devices. To date, the superior products in the market are separated into two types. The first one uses network-based interface adapter/gateway technology, which utilizes TCP/IP socket programs in the host and TCP/IP socket programs in the interface adapter/gateway to extend the original peripheral device interface driver to the network. The second uses UPnP device adaptor technology, which is the mainstream technology for digital home use. At the host end, by adding the technology of UPnP control point communication stack, the application program of the host is capable of using the function of the UPnP control point. At the device end, a UPnP device adapter capable of using a UPnP control point communication stack is used to transform original devices into UPnP devices. Therefore, the host can communicate with the device through UPnP communications protocol to achieve functions, e.g., automatic configuration, discovery, description, device service description, remote procedure call or event reply, etc.
To date, the available network-type interface adapter/gateway devices execute only interface transformation, such as transformation between TCP/IP and RS232 or between TCP/IP and USB. The network addresses of such products must be set manually, and used at fixed TCP/UDP ports. Furthermore, there is no description function between these products and the host, nor is there any status report.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,779,004 and 7,171,475 disclose a UPnP device structure and interface. Although the device is more user-friendly, there is a trade-off of high hardware and software costs. Another disadvantage is limited compatibility with other devices.